With increased awareness for improved security, various techniques have been introduced, that restrict output of a confidential document, for example, as described in the Japanese Patent Application Publication Nos. 2004-274092 and 2007-37099. For example, in the office environment, an image forming apparatus may be programmed such that, when an original document to be processed is determined to be the confidential document, the image forming apparatus prohibits copying of the confidential document or restricts the output of confidential document even when a user instruction for outputting the confidential document is received.
In one example, the confidential document may be embedded with additional information indicating that the document is the confidential document. When the additional information is detected, the image forming apparatus determines that the original document is the confidential document, and prohibits copying of the confidential document.
In another example, the confidential document may be embedded with additional information specifying the authorized processing to be performed on the confidential document. When the additional information is detected, the image forming apparatus determines processing to be performed based on the additional information, and performs the determined processing on the confidential document.
FIG. 1 is a flowchart illustrating operation of controlling processing to be performed on document data according to additional information obtained from the document data. In this example, it is assumed that the additional information is embedded in the form of pattern.
S100 obtains a pattern from the document data to be processed.
S101 determines whether additional information is detected in the pattern obtained at S100. When it is determined that the additional information is detected (“YES” at S101), the operation proceeds to S102. When it is determined that the additional information is not detected (“NO” at S101), the operation ends to allow any desired operation to be performed on the document data.
S102 determines processing to be performed on the document data according to the additional information detected at S101, and the operation ends.